


Choking on My Feelings

by SimplyStardust



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Harley Quinn (Comics), Poison Ivy (Comics)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Hanahaki Disease, Nightwing cares about everyone, Unhappy Ending, description of corpses, even villains, idk if I would call it graphic, no beta we die like jason
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:13:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26946502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SimplyStardust/pseuds/SimplyStardust
Summary: Ivy can recall her and Harley's relationship as a series of firsts and lasts (Hanahaki AU)READ THE ARCHIVE WARNING
Relationships: Joker (DCU)/Harleen Quinzel, Pamela Isley/Harleen Quinzel
Comments: 2
Kudos: 39





	Choking on My Feelings

The first time Pamela Isley met Harleen Quinzel was during her freshman year in Gotham University’s required communications class. They were assigned partners for a project. Pam was a biology major. Harleen was a psychology major.

They did well on the project, earning an A. Harley asked if she wanted to go out for drinks to celebrate and she accepted. That was the start of a friendship that lasted the whole school year

The last time Harleen Quinzel met Pamela Isley was at the annual end of the school year party. They danced and hugged and drank all night long. They promised to keep in touch over the summer, but with her new internship with Dr. Woodrue, the two eventually forgot about each other.

* * *

The first time Harleen Quinzel met Poison Ivy was in Arkham Asylum. Harleen had already been working at Arkham for a couple of weeks when she was assigned a new patient. When she read her file, she was shocked to find that she vaguely remembered her from college.

She learned that the doctor Pamela, now “Poison Ivy”, had briefly mentioned interning with had experimented on and abused her. As a result, she developed abilities and a hatred for humanity, which she used for “eco-terrorism”.

Taking a deep breath, she entered the room with Ivy and her guard. As she sat down across from her, she could see Ivy’s eyes widen ever so slightly with recognition. Harleen smiled in response and outstretched her hand.

Ivy raised an eyebrow. “Freely offering your hand to a villain infamous for their poisons and toxins? I can’t tell if you’re incredibly ballsy or just dumb.”

Harleen gave a small chuckle. “Can’t it be both? Or can it be an attempt to establish trust and mutual respect?”

Ivy seemed to consider her options. After a moment, she took Harleen’s hand and shook it.

The last time Poison Ivy met Harleen Quinzel was for a therapy session.

She had been making progress (she no longer wanted to brutally murder every human in existence), all due to Harleen. She had this quality to her. No one else had ever connected with her as well as she did.

Unlike her previous therapist, Harleen made her actually want to be “good” per say. She wanted to change and show Harleen that her work was successful.

The session seemed like any other but looking back, Ivy could see the clues that something was off.  
Harleen kept nervously looking around as if she felt that any moment now someone would pop up and arrest her. And at the end instead of her usually curt head nod and thank you, Harleen once again took Ivy’s hand and said “Thank you, for all our time together. I cherish it, truly.”

Ivy thought that she was just being sappy, but next session would learn the truth.

* * *

The first time that Poison Ivy learned about Harley Quinn was when she went to her scheduled therapy session and was greeted by the sight of a new psychiatrist.

“Who the hell are you?”

The new psychiatrist seemed unfazed by her harsh reaction. “I’m Dr. Matthews. I’ll be your new practitioner.”

“Where’s Harleen?”

“Ms. Quinzel was compromised.”

“What on earth do you mean?”

He sighed and put his head in his hand as if he’d been having to relay this information all day. “She was seduced by one of her patients, the Joker, and has run off to play sidekick to him.”

In shock, Ivy silently sulked for the rest of the session.

That night, she broke out of Arkham for the first time in months. There was nothing left here for her.

* * *

The first time that Poison Ivy coughed up a flower was after the annual meeting of Gotham’s rogues.

It took place at the Iceberg Lounge, specially closed for the night. All of Gotham’s biggest rogues would sit around a large table at the center of the club and would discuss borders, truces and other agreements.

Ivy usually looked forward to it. It was a great chance to meet up with her friends who didn’t run in the same circles as she did.

This year, she hated it because of one big reason: Harley Quinn.

Ivy didn’t hate Harley. No, she could never hate Harley. She hated that Harley was perched on the Joker’s lap the entire meeting, arms’ entangled around him. She would occasionally whisper in his ear which would always be followed by the two of them bursting with laughter.

She looked at him like he was the sun, the stars and everything else above. He didn’t do the same.

Ivy eventually couldn’t stand watching her give so much love to someone who didn’t actually care. She excused herself to the bathroom.

There she stared at her reflection in the sink mirror. She didn’t love Harley, she just hated to see men like Joker manipulate women. Or at least that’s what she tried to tell herself.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden and unexpected coughing fit. She hacked something into the sink. Once she got it out, she quickly pocketed it and reapplied her lipstick before returning to the meeting.

She swore she wasn’t jealous, but the bud she just coughed up said otherwise.

* * *

The first person to notice that something was wrong was Nightwing. The vigilante had always had a bleeding heart, even for criminals.

Ivy was used to having weird things happen to her body. Even when those weird things were coughing up Sparaxises aka Wandflowers aka Harlequin flowers. Yeah, she knew. Ironic. (Looks like that botany degree didn’t go totally to waste.) She was an experiment after all. She kept track of everything strange that happened to her body in her research journals. That’s how she realized that her “fits” were related to her… feelings to Harley.

But Ivy was never good with feelings. So she continued with life as usually, even when the buds she coughed up started to bloom.

When that happened, she went to a doctor who she had blackmail on and had him take an xray. That’s how she learned that flowers were growing in her lungs. That’s how she learned that she was probably going to die soon. She killed the doctor and destroyed the readings.

She tried to distract herself from her impending doom by being more active with her schemes. It was working, but it had its drawbacks.

One of which she was experiencing right now. She was fighting Nightwing on the roof of the Gotham City Greenhouse. He was dodging and flipping through her twisting vines that tried to grasp him. Ivy was trying to focus on catching him off guard when she felt another flower make its way up her windpipe.

Reluctantly, she let the vines drop. She hoped that if she got the flower out of her quickly enough, she could jump right back into combat.

She soon realized that she underestimated the size of this bunch of sparaxis. She dropped to her knees and was forced to hack hard.

When she finally coughed it out, she wiped the blood and spittle from her mouth. She sat back up and was surprised by the presence of Nightwing sitting next to her with a worried look on his face. She immediately jumped into a defensive position.

However, he did not attack her. He only asked her if she was ok.

She turned away from him. “It’s fine. Just a plant person thing.”

“Are you sure becaus-”

“I said I’m fine,” she looked back at him who looked at her with suspicion. “So what, are you going to take me to Arkham?”

He stood up and told her to “Go home, get some rest, try to stop committing crimes for a bit.” before flipping off to the rest of his patrol.

* * *

The last time Poison Ivy saw Harley was when they were met up for brunch.

Harley eventually reached out to her after the meeting and they had stayed in contact since. They had been meeting for brunch every couple of weeks. This time, Ivy planned to tell her about her… condition.

They’d already finished ordering when Ivy said, “Hey Harls, there’s something I need to tell you about…”

“What is it?”, responded Harley, surprised by her friend’s seriousness.

“Well, recently-”

Ivy was cut off by the ringing of Harley’s phone. Harley motioned for her to pause and picked up as she mouthed a quick sorry.

“Mistah J, how’d things go?”. At the response on the other end, Harley’s face took on an expression of worry.

“I'll be right there,” she turned back to Ivy. “I’m so sorry, I gotta bail. J was on a job and things are going belly up.”

Resolve lost, Ivy lied “Yeah, it’s fine.”

Harley thanked her and ran out the restaurant.

Ivy put her head down on the table and let out a small groan. She was screwed.

* * *

The last breaths that Ivy took was when she was sitting in her bathroom, half heartedly trying to aim the flowers for the toilet.

She had known the end was beginning two days ago. That’s when she felt the roots of the plants begin to prod her lungs. She knew it was only a matter of time until they would puncture them. Then she’d be a goner.

The puncturing had started at 9 last night. The flowers had gone from occasionally having some blood on them to being drenched in it.

It was now coming up on 2 am. Ivy could feel the flower, making its way up her throat. It was bigger than all the others, far too big to cough up. Giving up, Ivy lay on the bathroom floor and closed her eyes.

At least the pain would finally be over now.

* * *

The first person to find her body was Selina. She had heard radio silence from Ivy the past few days and wanted to check on her.

She entered Ivy’s apartment.

“Ivy? You ok?”

She looked through Ivy’s living room, kitchen and bedroom. No sign of her.

That’s when she spotted the cracked open door of Ivy’s bathroom. She opened the door, bracing herself for the worst and finding it.

Selina’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh god...”, she said and started to cry.

On the tiled bathroom floor was Ivy’s dead body. Selina was not a stranger to cadavers, but there was a big difference between seeing the corpse of a random goon vs your best friend’s.

Ivy’s skin was a far paler green than normal. Her eyes were closed and her blood covered lips were in a small smile. Bloody wildflowers were strewn throughout the floor and toilet.

Once she got over the immediate shock, she called the police and then Bruce.

* * *

The last person to leave Ivy's funeral was Harley. She spent an hour in front of Ivy's new grave, a willow tree, until Selina eventually took her home.

She came to the funeral alone. Joker couldn't care less about the death of anyone who wasn't a business partner or on his hit list.

As Selina took her to her car, she could hear the crying Harley whisper "I just want her back".


End file.
